Solved Green Checkmarks On Desktop Shortcuts - But the OneDrive App is Uninstalled

BulldogX · Dec 11, 2024

As others have experienced, I started to see green checkmarks on my desktop shortcuts:

Ordinarily, this means that the files are backed up on OneDrive. Problem: I uninstalled the OneDrive app more than a year ago. It has not returned (I checked.) Other times I see little file boxes:

Nice. But I don't have the OneDrive app. And there's more. I also see little green arrows:

Cute. This only happens to files on my desktop - nowhere else - and the overlays change from green checkmarks to file boxes to green arrows completely on their own, after about 30 seconds. Oh look, there's been another change. Now I'm back to the usual shortcut arrow.

Something is doing this on its own. It isn't harming anything, that I can tell. But it's weird. Can I get it to stop?

As always, thanks for your help.

glasskuter · Dec 11, 2024

For things to work as they are supposed to, there is a proper series of events if one wants to uninstall Onedrive. One can't just arbitrarily uninstall onedrive without first turning off backup folder syncing and then unlinking from Onedrive.

Turn off, disable, or uninstall OneDrive - Microsoft Support

Learn how to turn off or uninstall OneDrive.

support.microsoft.com

PC first.

colinp · Dec 11, 2024

I have those green checkmarks as well and I don't use OneDrive either. However, I do use Google Drive.

BulldogX · Dec 11, 2024

glasskuter said:
For things to work as they are supposed to, there is a proper series of events if one wants to uninstall Onedrive. One can't just arbitrarily uninstall onedrive without first turning off backup folder syncing and then unlinking from Onedrive.

Turn off, disable, or uninstall OneDrive - Microsoft Support

Learn how to turn off or uninstall OneDrive.

support.microsoft.com

PC first.

I wonder why you presumed that I don't know how to properly uninstall the OneDrive app.

BulldogX · Dec 11, 2024

colinp said:
I have those green checkmarks as well and I don't use OneDrive either. However, I do use Google Drive.

I use Google Drive too, but not the Google Drive app. (I don't believe I've ever installed it.)

It might be Microsoft's doing, since they are insistent about people using their OneDrive. But I don't have the facts, so I can't put the blame on them.

antspants · Dec 11, 2024

BulldogX said:
I wonder why you presumed that I don't know how to properly uninstall the OneDrive app.

Because you haven’t stated otherwise and if these are actually Microsoft OneDrive Desktop Icon Overlays, it would indicate that you have not removed OneDrive correctly.

glasskuter freely gives her time to this forum and its members.

FYI we cannot presume to know what you know and what you don’t
When you ask for help here, you will get many questions according to your help request. Unless you cover all the bases, we’re left with filling in the blanks.

BulldogX · Dec 11, 2024

antspants said:
Because you haven’t stated otherwise and if these are actually Microsoft OneDrive Desktop Icon Overlays, it would indicate that you have not removed OneDrive correctly.

glasskuter freely gives her time to this forum and its members.

FYI we cannot presume to know what you know and what you don’t
When you ask for help here, you will get many questions according to your help request. Unless you cover all the bases, we’re left with filling in the blanks.

If someone cannot presume to know what I know and what I don’t, then how about this:

"Perhaps you were unaware that there is a series of steps to perform before uninstalling the OneDrive app. There's more to it than uninstalling the app. If you were not aware, I will be glad to explain."

I've never received such rough treatment in this forum, so I'll say this is a one-off. Everyone has them, including me.

antspants · Dec 11, 2024

It’s not personal, the forum works. Go with the flow.

glasskuter · Dec 11, 2024

BulldogX said:
I wonder why you presumed that I don't know how to properly uninstall the OneDrive app.

Because you did not tell us. This is a help forum. 95% of the folks who ask for help with Onedrive think all they have to do is uninstall Onedrive. (Don't believe me. Check the many, many posts about it) We can't presume to know anything unless you tell us up front. Therefore, we have no alternative but to presume you don't know it. Our answers are given based on the info WE ARE GIVEN.
All your title said was "But the OneDrive App is Uninstalled".

BulldogX said:
I've never received such rough treatment in this forum,

Rough treatment??? How so? I stated facts. @antspants stated facts. I would have answered anyone else the exact same way. If there's been any assumption on my part, it's that we're all adults and can handle facts without getting overly sensitive about them. Guess I was wrong.

antspants · Dec 11, 2024

BulldogX said:
-

It’s a little hard to see in your screenshots, but from what I can tell, I don’t believe these are OneDrive icon overlays.

As far as I know (I could be wrong) the solid green circle Onedrive Overlay is as follows. Note the darker green stroke which I can tell if yours have.

OneDrive - Always keep on this device

What do the OneDrive icons mean? - Microsoft Support

support.microsoft.com

Other software that can add these overlays are Google Drive (as already mentioned) Nortons software, possibly AVG, Dropbox.
They actually look very similar to the green tick overlay that Carbonite and BOX Cloud services uses. And I don’t believe those arrows are microsoft related.
There are most likely other possibilities?

I remember from a few other threads here that I replied to, that there had been reports on Reddit about a glitch and believe it or not, right clicking on the desktop and selecting “Refresh” has sorted this out.

You could also try cleaning out the icon cache and rebuild it

Clear and Reset Thumbnail Cache in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to clear and reset the thumbnail cache for your account in Windows 10 and Windows 11. Windows keeps a copy of all your picture, video, and document thumbnails in a cache so they can be reused to quickly display when you open a folder instead of having to manually...

www.elevenforum.com

Rebuild Icon Cache in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to rebuild the icon cache to clear and reset it for your account in Windows 10 and Windows 11. The icons that display for files in Windows are saved in an icon cache so they can be displayed quickly instead of having to manually scan and slowly load them each...

www.elevenforum.com

pseymour · Dec 11, 2024

My old post about disabling icon overlay handlers, so you can see who the culprit is...

Lock Image on Desktop Shortcuts??

I just noticed I have a lock image on every desktop shortcut. I don't see that it affects the way my icons work. I can still right click on them and get options. Just not sure what caused this or how to remove?

www.elevenforum.com

antspants · Dec 11, 2024

pseymour said:
My old post about disabling icon overlay handlers, so you can see who the culprit is...

Lock Image on Desktop Shortcuts??

I just noticed I have a lock image on every desktop shortcut. I don't see that it affects the way my icons work. I can still right click on them and get options. Just not sure what caused this or how to remove?

www.elevenforum.com

Lmao at the sig

You always make me laugh, P-man

pseymour · Dec 11, 2024

Just a little tribute for the return of The Great One

antspants · Dec 11, 2024

Thanks, you Irish

antspants · Dec 11, 2024

OneDrive Icon Overlays explained

What do the OneDrive icons mean? - Microsoft Support

support.microsoft.com

Other than glasskuter correctly suggesting that check that all the correct steps to uninstall OneDrive were followed via tutorials in here, and pseymours great suggestion of using Shellxview, can I suggest you do the ‘ol Ctrl Alt Del and check out what might be running in the task manager that is related to backup, like Dropbox.

BulldogX · Mar 7, 2025

BulldogX said:
As others have experienced, I started to see green checkmarks on my desktop shortcuts:
View attachment 119099
Ordinarily, this means that the files are backed up on OneDrive. Problem: I uninstalled the OneDrive app more than a year ago. It has not returned (I checked.) Other times I see little file boxes:
View attachment 119100
Nice. But I don't have the OneDrive app. And there's more. I also see little green arrows:
View attachment 119101
Cute. This only happens to files on my desktop - nowhere else - and the overlays change from green checkmarks to file boxes to green arrows completely on their own, after about 30 seconds. Oh look, there's been another change. Now I'm back to the usual shortcut arrow.

Something is doing this on its own. It isn't harming anything, that I can tell. But it's weird. Can I get it to stop?

As always, thanks for your help.

BulldogX · Mar 7, 2025

I believe I have discovered the solution for my problem.

The solution was to disconnect my computer from my Microsoft account. (After signing in to your Microsoft account, go to Devices > Remove device.)

Since I uninstalled the OneDrive app (correctly) shortly after receiving my computer, and re-did the default folder locations, I thought I was done with syncing. All was well until these icon overlays started showing up, a few months ago.

Even with no OneDrive app, Windows started to apply the usual OneDrive icon overlays to files on the desktop. (Why only the desktop? No idea.) After disconnecting my computer from my Microsoft account, the icon overlays vanished and have not returned for 8 days as of this writing.

There have been no negative consequences to doing this. It means I have to sign in (and sign out again) each time I want to use one of Microsoft's online properties (like OneDrive) but that's okay with me. I was doing that anyway.

I hope this solution works for others as well.

Stigg · Jul 8, 2025

OneDrive can be a pain sometimes.

OneDrive decided to backup my desktop shortcuts. I turned it off, then it removed them from the desktop and backed them up to a folder.

Steve C · Jul 10, 2025

This can happen when you mess around with OneDrive. This happened to me and I had to recover from a Reflect backup.

Stigg · Jul 10, 2025

Steve C said:
This can happen when you mess around with OneDrive. This happened to me and I had to recover from a Reflect backup.

OneDrive has a few traps for the unsuspecting. The Desktop shortcuts problem has happened to me at least twice, even though I don't mess with it. I suspect a OneDrive update is what causes these issues.

Solved Green Checkmarks On Desktop Shortcuts - But the OneDrive App is Uninstalled

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